Tech consultant for Olympia, Lacey, And Tumwater

The Music Industry is more staged than you think

Remember a few years ago when Nine Inch Nails And Radiohead both came up with very similar innovative ideas to get their music out? NIN made tons of money by giving the cd away and selling several limited editions. Radiohead sold their cd for “Whatever you want” through their website. Ever wonder how they both came up with two ideas that are basically giving away their music? Well, I’m not saying this is for sure the reason, but they (at least at the time) were handled by Nasty Little Man I found that to be a rather interesting coincidence. Remember not too long ago when Taylor Swift had that little incident with Kanye West? They both have the same agent. Coincidence? Maybe.

Now to be clear, I am not saying that either of these are anything other than interesting coincidences. However, they are very interesting coincidences. How much of the music industry is staged? Most of the things that the public thinks of as spontaneous events are actually totally well planned and well staged events. The bigger the artist, the more “handlers” they have. These handlers work very hard to make sure their artists get the most press. Press means cd sales. How much press did Kanye West get out of his “outlandish behavior” at that awards show? There is no such thing as bad press. Remember the fire at that Great White show a few years ago where several fans (and one band member) ended up burned to death? Right after wards the band had better sales than they had in about a decade. Now even I would be shocked if any part of that was planned, but that “bad press” made the band a ton of money. There is no such thing as bad press. So even events where it seems the artist end up with tons of egg on their face are good for them.

What is my point of this article? The bigger the artist, the more fake everything about them is. If you think for a second that the Adam Lambert kiss controversy was a spontaneous decision that he regretted, you are dumber than a rock! It was just the shock that his handlers needed. Him getting kicked off of one morning show was the greatest thing that could have happened. Think about how much more press he got because of it all. The bigger the artist, the more fake and planned out everything they do is. Is Lady Gaga a hermaphrodite? She has said so a few times. Her people have denied it and people close to her have said it is not true. However, it doesn’t matter. What matters is that even I am talking about it! If it’s shocking to the general public, and gets the artist tons of press, it was staged. The music industry is more staged than you think.

Now most of my music industry contacts will hate me for even mentioning this site, but screw them and their dying industry I say! Seriously, I think those labels could get some major traction out of TPB if they played it smart. Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails has a profile page on the site for a reason. Imagine if some unknown band out of nowhere put up their great new cd on TPB. Then promoted the hell out of the free download with a $2,000 ad campaign from Fixion Media (or even more at IndieClick if you have the extra cash). Sure you wouldn’t make any money from the cd directly, but imagine how many new fans you would gain? Then you would have a draw in cities you have never been to before.

The costs of recording a cd are getting cheaper, so forget about going to a full scale studio unless some big label is footing the bill. For the price you would pay a studio you could record it at home. Instead spend that money on promoting to people that you are offering a free download of your new cd at The Pirate Bay. The tech savvy music fans love this kind of thing, so you could end up getting some free promotion from tech blogs as well.

So do you just release one cd every few years and call it good? Why not have a friend record the band playing shows, slap the footage together using Windows Movie Maker (it comes free with any windows system), and release the “DVD” as a free download through TPB as well. What about recording some live shows in audio format and release a new live cd every few weeks. With a good digital recorder it will not cost you a cent, but it will get you some free promotion.

How to make money by giving the music away for free is the question I am sure you are asking though. You will want something for all your hard work I am sure. Well first off you will be able to have more of a draw when you do the “get in the van” style DIY tour next summer. You can also make money off of shirts, hats, beer mugs, and physical copies of the things you have offered as a download. Think outside the box a little with this stuff. Combine the physical cd with a shirt maybe? Put the live DVD of you playing the new cd in it’s entirety together as one package. Once people are hooked they will pay! Trent Reznor made $1.6 million in one week doing this. Now of course your band is probably not even in the same ballpark as NIN is, but if done right I think you will make more in the long run.

Doing things this way is more about expanding your fanbase than anything else. There is a legendary band I work with. They had a really good fanbase when the leader of the band dug the band name out of the grave a few years ago and put together a new line up. But I saw them playing 500 seat clubs. Then Ozzfest announced that they were taking fan ideas for what band’s should be on the next tour. So I thought I would use that fanbase to do my best to get the band on Ozzfest playing in front of 5,000 people a day on the second stage. When I posted the idea on the forum the fans were offended and would not vote for the band to be on the tour. Most decent bands that play this tour end up playing thousand seat clubs at least right after the tour. This could have been a major part of this band coming back in a huge way, but the fans thought it was an insult for them to be playing the second stage. So instead they get the insult of playing to the smallest clubs in the land. I tell this story to make a point. Making it big takes major sacrifices. If you don’t make those sacrifices you will stagnate and eventually die. Does it suck to spend thousands to give stuff away for free? Yes! But does it suck more to go nowhere? How much would it suck it you used TPB to gain your band a really good draw at clubs all around the country? I have a feeling it wouldn’t suck as much as playing to a small handful of drunks on a Tuesday. Right?

The Hard Rock Social News site I am part of called HeavyAsHell.com has an account at TPB and will be releasing stuff like crazy there soon. Check it out at http://thepiratebay.org/user/HeavyAsHell